Archive of ‘social media’ category

Facebook Live and Periscope for library use

We conducted a short 5 min live session on Facebook Live and Periscope; the first of three mini-series to test the potential of these tools for academic purposes:
Here is the link to the LITA Webinar Facebook Group page:https://www.facebook.com/groups/LitaSocialMediaWebinar/

New Features for Instagram Stories: This Week in Social Media

Instagram Adds Boomerang, Mention Tags, and Links to Instagram Stories: Instagram introduced two new tools “to help you make your story even more fun, Boomerang and mentions,” and announced that it’s starting “to test links inside some stories.” Boomerang, which “lets you turn everyday moments into something fun and unexpected,” can be selected as an additional format option under the Record button. Boomerang records and stitches together “a burst of photos into a mini video that plays forward and backward.” Users can also tag and mention people in stories just as they do in Instagram captions and comments. These updates for Instagram Stories are available as part of Instagram version 9.7 available for iOS in the Apple App Store. It’s also available on Android and Windows.

Facebook Opens Sponsored Messages on Messenger: As part of a larger Messenger update “designed to provide visibility into optimal entry points, enhance existing conversations and enable you to build better overall experiences,” Facebook made sponsored messages within Messenger generally available to all advertisers. According to Facebook, “sponsored messages give businesses the ability to send targeted updates, information about promotions, reminders and other relevant messages.” All Facebook advertisers can now reach people through sponsored posts and ads in the news feed and direct them to a conversation in Messenger.

Periscope Introduces New Ways to Connect With Audiences: Periscope rolled out “three new ways to connect with your audiences and the communities on Periscope – with Superfans, groups, and logging into Periscope.tv.” The new Superfans feature allows broadcasters to identify and target the top 10 “most engaged” members of their audience. Building on this information, broadcasters can now create groups where they can “broadcast to and share videos with more granular sets of people” such as friends, superfans, or a community built around specific interests. The Superfans and Groups features are available on the Periscope app for Android and iOS and on the web.

Periscope recently updated Periscope.tv with an “easier way to search, browse suggested and highlighted channels” and has just rolled out “a more complete web experience” that allows users to send hearts in any live video on Periscope.tv.

Snapchat Adds New World Lenses, Rewind Capabilities, and Support for Spectacles: With its recent updates for iOS and Android, Snapchat introduced World Lenses. Similar to Snapchat’s Selfie Lenses, the new World Lenses change your background and surroundings. According to TechCrunch, “some World Lenses will actually animate your face too and can have different effects depending on if you use your front- or rear-facing camera.” Snapchat also added the ability to rewind individual snaps and entire stories with just one swipe.

if a student posted a disparaging remark about a fellow student or a faculty member, “it wouldn’t be difficult” for the victim of the insult to figure out where the offensive commentary was posted from and then pinpoint the probable yakker from there.

A course for librarians who want to explore the institutional application of social media. Based on an established academic course at St. Cloud State University “Social Media in Global Context” (more information at http://web.stcloudstate.edu/pmiltenoff/lib290/ ).
Critically examine the institutional need of social media and juxtapose it to its private use. Discussion about the mechanics of choice for recent and future SM tools. Theoretical introduction to the subculture of social media. How to streamline library SM policies with the goals and mission of the institution. Hands-on exercises on creation and dissemination of textual and multimedia content and patrons’ engagement. Brainstorming on suitable for the institution strategies regarding resources, human and technological, workload share, storytelling, and branding.

This is a blended format web course:

The course will be delivered as 4 separate live webinar lectures, one per week on:

Wednesdays, September 21, 28, October 5 and 12
2:00 – 3:00 pm Central
You do not have to attend the live lectures in order to participate. The webinars will be recorded and distributed through the web course platform, Moodle for asynchronous participation. The web course space will also contain the exercises and discussions for the course.

the difference between small business and academic institution, being that the library or the entire university, is that small business is reliant on itself; if it does not well, it perishes. The library and the university are reliant on external funds and can fester for a long time. But eventually it dies. In that sense, learning from the lessons for small business can help:

Branding is not mimicking someone else (another library[s)). It is not a superficial activity. It is not slapping pictures on social media. “Interact” is the key word. “Likes” in FB does not reflect complete interaction

know your numbers. Analytics is not about “likes” and “visits.” it deeper datamining, which can explain behavior and predict behavior

if success is failure, why safeguarding the social media in particular and the entire behavior of the library from “failure.” Isolating students or staff from acting with the excuse to safeguard from failure is practically isolating innovation.